TL;DR: New benefits should earn their place. The best way to judge them is to tie each option to a clear business goal, build a simple ROI case, test likely demand with claims and demographic data, and benchmark the design against the employers you compete with for talent.
Key Takeaways
- Start with one or two business outcomes, not a trendy benefit.
- Count all costs, including admin time, communication, and expected use.
- Use grouped claims data and workforce demographics to test real need.
- Benchmark Plan Design and employer spend, not just whether peers offer it.
A new benefit can look smart in a board deck and still miss the mark in practice. Without cost-control, spend rises while retention, hiring, and productivity stay flat.
That risk is real because Family-Building Benefits have moved into the mainstream. SHRM and IFEBP reported that about 42% of employers offered Fertility Benefits in 2024, up from 40% in 2022. Mercer also found that 45% of large employers covered IVF in 2023. Those numbers matter, but they do not mean every employer should add the same benefit in the same way.
Start with the business goal, not the benefit #
The first question is simple: what problem are you trying to solve?
A benefit should support the business and the employee population at the same time. If it does not improve a defined outcome, it is another expense line. Strong leaders make this decision with the same discipline they bring to any other investment.
That is why a long-view strategy matters. A more durable approach starts with a custom benefits strategy via Evolution framework, where decisions connect to measurable outcomes instead of one-year reactions.
Possible goals include lower turnover, stronger recruiting, fewer unplanned absences, better productivity, or a better employee experience. Each goal points to a different benefit design. Each also changes how you measure success.
Pick one or two outcomes you want to improve #
Keep the goal narrow enough to test.
If HR wants better retention, Finance wants lower spend, and leadership wants a stronger employer brand, the model can get muddy fast. Pick one or two outcomes first, then measure against those.
For example, a manufacturer struggling to keep skilled technicians may focus on retention and absenteeism. A professional services firm hiring younger talent may focus on applicant volume and acceptance rates. A hospital facing burnout may focus on productivity and reduced stress-related absence.
If leadership cannot name the outcome, the benefit is still a guess.
That focus also improves the business case. You do not need to prove that one benefit fixes everything. You need to show that it improves the specific areas that matter most now.
Make sure the benefit fits your workforce #
Good design starts with listening. It also starts with knowing who your people are.
A fertility or family-forming benefit may fit a workforce with many employees ages 25 to 40, especially in roles where hiring is hard and replacement costs are high. Caregiving support may fit an older workforce or a population with many employees caring for parents. Mental health support often fits high-stress roles, shift-based work, and jobs with burnout risk.
Demographics are only part of the picture. Life stage, family status, work setting, income mix, and current plan use all matter. When a benefit matches real need, it feels personal to employees and rational to leadership.
Build a simple ROI model leadership can trust #
Once the goal is clear, put numbers around it. The model does not need to be fancy. It needs to be honest.
Use the standard formula:
ROI = ((gains – costs) / costs) x 100
That gives Finance a clean starting point. Still, many benefit decisions also deserve a broader view of employee trust, communication, and support, which is why JA often frames the bigger picture as Return on Relationship beyond traditional ROI.
Here is a plain-English view of what belongs in the model:
| Category | What to include |
|---|---|
| Costs | Vendor fees, employer contributions, admin time, communication, training, expected utilization |
| Gains | Lower turnover costs, stronger recruiting, fewer absences, productivity gains, lower claims risk where applicable |
The takeaway is simple. A benefit’s sticker price is only one part of the case.
Count the full cost before you make the case #
Many employers stop at the vendor quote. That misses the real first-year spend.
You also need to count employee education, payroll setup, legal review, eligibility rules, manager training, and time spent by HR. In addition, some benefits require stronger communication because low awareness can suppress use and distort early results.
Build two views. The first should estimate year-one cost, when rollout expense is highest. The second should show years two and three, when startup work falls and utilization patterns become clearer.
This matters for cost-control. Some benefits create fast talent value but slower financial return. Fertility support is a good example. It may improve recruiting quickly, while claims patterns and retention impact become clearer over a longer period.
Estimate gains in retention, hiring, and productivity #
Now estimate the upside in terms leadership already uses.
Start with retention. Replacement cost for key roles can be high, especially when you add recruiter fees, training time, lost output, and manager distraction. A small drop in turnover can justify a meaningful share of the benefit cost.
Hiring can also move the number. Family-Building Benefits are now common enough to shape candidate expectations. With more than 4 in 10 employers offering fertility support, a missing benefit can narrow your appeal in some labor markets. A fair planning model may assume a 15% lift in applicant volume for target roles when fertility support closes a clear market gap.
Productivity is often the least precise estimate, but it should not be ignored. Stress, untreated mental health needs, and poor access to care reduce focus and increase missed work. The business case gets stronger when you connect benefits to the costs of poor employee health on productivity.
A simple example helps. If a fertility benefit costs $180,000 in year one, and it helps avoid two departures in hard-to-fill roles at $85,000 each, plus $40,000 in recruiting savings, total gains reach $210,000. That puts ROI at about 16.7%. Even if your estimate is imperfect, the method is clear.
Use claims and utilization data to test real demand #
Benefits decisions should not rely on anecdotes alone. Claims and enrollment data help you separate real demand from a low-use perk.
Use grouped, anonymous data only. The goal is not to find out who needs support. The goal is to understand patterns in the population.
This step also helps leadership avoid false choices. Some benefits look expensive until you compare them to the cost of untreated need, delayed care, or lost talent.
Look for patterns that show unmet need #
Start with claims by condition and service type. Review repeated high-cost episodes, gaps in current support, and signs that employees seek care outside the plan.
With fertility, you may see rising reproductive health claims, prescription patterns tied to infertility treatment, or a workforce age mix that points to family-forming demand. With mental health, you may see growing use of emergency care, low outpatient follow-up, or high absence in stressed departments.
Low use of a current benefit does not always mean low need. It can also mean the benefit is hard to access, poorly explained, or too narrow to matter.
Forecast utilization before adding coverage #
Forecasting use is part math and part judgment.
Start with age bands, family status, current use of related benefits, and past claims patterns. Then apply a realistic participation range. For a new family-building benefit, you might model low, expected, and high use scenarios, then test the budget impact of each.
Pilot programs can help when demand is uncertain. So can phased rollouts, capped employer support, or a point solution before full coverage. Those options protect cost-control while giving leadership real data to work from.
Low use can mean low need, but it can also mean poor communication or hard access.
That is why post-launch measurement matters as much as the initial forecast.
Benchmark the benefit so the investment stays competitive and cost-effective #
A benefit should fit your market, not a headline.
Benchmarking tells you whether a proposed benefit is below market, aligned with peers, or priced too rich for the value it delivers. Strong benchmarking also looks past simple yes-or-no comparisons. Design details matter, including Employer Contribution, eligibility, caps, and expected use.
JA’s approach to customized benchmarking data for better benefits decisions reflects that point well. Clear comparisons help leaders act with confidence because the data is easier to interpret and use.
Compare against employers your team actually competes with for talent #
Use a benchmark set that matches your hiring reality.
Industry matters. Geography matters. Workforce type matters. Company size matters too. A Midwest manufacturer, a regional health system, and a national tech firm should not use the same comparison group.
This is where many teams get tripped up. They compare against broad national averages that do not reflect their labor market. That can lead to overspending or underinvesting.
A better benchmark asks, “Who do we compete with for the same people?” Then it tests benefit value against that group.
Choose the right level of benefit, not the richest option #
Cost-effective design does not always mean full coverage.
In many cases, a capped Employer Contribution, narrower eligibility at launch, or a focused point solution creates better value than the richest plan on the market. The goal is to match support to need and budget, then expand if the data supports it.
This is especially useful for newer benefits. You may start with fertility navigation and limited financial support before moving to broader coverage. For caregiving, you may offer referral support first, then add richer paid benefits if use and impact justify it.
Good benchmarking helps here because it compares several design choices side by side. That gives HR, Finance, and executive leaders a decision-ready view instead of a vague market summary.
Make the decision with data and purpose #
The strongest benefits decisions follow a clear sequence. Define the goal, build a simple ROI case, test demand with claims and demographic data, and benchmark the design before launch.
The best new benefit is not the newest one or the most talked about one. It is the one that creates measurable outcomes for employees and the business, while keeping cost-control intact.
